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Posted: **2006-02-08 07:02pm**

Just stumbled across this when looking into the new Windows (and finding that most of what Vista was meant to have has gone on over to "Vienna").

Silicon Valley Sleuth wrote:The truth about Windows Vista? It's vapourware

Bill Gates earlier this month had the opportunity to show off Windows Vista to the world. His keynote at the Consumer Electronics Show was actually the first time that the Microsoft chairman demonstrated the forthcoming operating system to an audience outside Microsoft – no developers or hardware engineers.

Surely a company will show the best features in a demonstration of this year's most important product launch at the world's most important consumer electronics show, before partners, competitors and a gathering of media from all over the world?

The pictures from his keynote show perfectly well what those features are:

A way to scroll through your applications in 3D – and while alt-tabbing your movies will be able to see your movies still playing and preview documents;

Next came sidebar, the idea that Microsoft stole from Apple's Dashboard, which stole it from Konfabulator.

What about the new photo editing tools? It allows Windows to do what Google's free Picasa application has been doing for years: organise photos.

And certainly don't forget the new user interface for your windows and applications like Windows Media Player. Because, really, its shiny black interface is the main thing that a user will see when he boots up Vista, and the only feature that's really new about the operating system. All the other "new" features are just rip-offs of existing applications that Microsoft copied. In the end, Vista won't do anything that Windows XP can't do already with a little help from third party vendors.

As a user, would these features make you stand in line to purchase a copy, some night in November when Microsoft chooses to launch Windows Vista?

Even Windows boss Jim Alchin seems to realise that his offering has become extremely weak. So in trying to justify he five years that his team spent on delaying developing the product, he is now touting safety and security as Vista's big feature.

"Even if [people] are not into home entertainment or in any of the specialty areas, they are just going to feel safer and more secure by using [Vista]," Alchin told Zdnet.

Cynicism has taken over in Redmond. Microsoft has taken five years to finally make a secure operating system and now wants us to pay for it. After Microsoft pulled every feature in the software, all that's left now are under the hood adjustments.

Put it in a box and slap a price on it, because Microsoft's monopoly days are far from over.

Posted: **2006-02-08 07:34pm**

From the end-user, Vista would looke like vaporware(and it is hip to bash Microsoft).

But anyone actively involved in the developer community (aka developers, programmers and wannabes) can fairly trivially get thier hands on the latest Vista codebase released.

It is a major update of the Windows NT codebase, no question about it. There are a number of features will only become apparent once 3rd party developers make use of them.

My favorites;

Quaility of Serives from the filesystem. Getting a garrientied minium amount of disk I/O.
A result of this is Virus Scanners & the like will now be able to wait until there are no pending I/O operations before scanning.
Per application volumn control
Distributed user profiles between workgroup computers. Doman-lite for workgroups (still looking for confermation of this)

There are a fuckload of improvements for the Administrators and developers, the end users happen to get some shiny stuff too. Also OEMs is where Microsoft makes thier money for Windows. They really couldnt give a shit if no-one upgraded on an existing machine(if they do, it a bonus).

Posted: **2006-02-08 07:36pm**

I really hope this isn't anything other than true...

Posted: **2006-02-08 11:41pm**

Now if only they can release the useful stuff without the useless shells of DRM packing material and suchlike. Not sure if any of you worked with Media Center at all, but we've had a problem on a system at work where Media Center's integrated DRM pitched a shit-fit and completely stopped the system from playing video of any kind, even DVDs.

Posted: **2006-02-09 12:01am**

Destructionator XIII wrote:From what I've seen, Windows Vista is going to offer alot of stuff that will be really nice. While much of it is already possible with Windows XP, Vista is making it easier to do and more effective.

Couldn't they do that with XP by issuing further updates to the OS?

Posted: **2006-02-09 02:42am**

Spanky The Dolphin wrote:
Destructionator XIII wrote:From what I've seen, Windows Vista is going to offer alot of stuff that will be really nice. While much of it is already possible with Windows XP, Vista is making it easier to do and more effective.
Couldn't they do that with XP by issuing further updates to the OS?

But then they wouldn't be able to charge extra for it.

Posted: **2006-02-09 02:57am**

Spanky The Dolphin wrote:Couldn't they do that with XP by issuing further updates to the OS?

Sure, it will only require a complete kernel upgrade, complete overhaul of all the drivers, replacing the network stack, audio stack, etc.

It is damn easier just to upgrade it all to Vista rather than piece-meal upgrade it and maintain several code forks.

Posted: **2006-02-09 02:57am**

They will actualy update XP with a lot of originaly only Vista tech because developers wanted a larger target (however, that tech will be there for compatibility only and will likely not have all the functionality of the stuff in Vista).

That said, even for regular users there will be a lot of small but useful enhancements. Like for instance editing metadata in common dialogs (save, possibly others). Considering that search in vista will be based on the current MSN Desktop Search and that WFS will be based on metadata for a lot of its functionality that is something very very useful.

Basicly, at least at the begining, Vista will bring eye-candy to the end users, while cleaning up and enhancing a lot of the background stuff (WPF and the like).

Honestly, I don't know what people crying "Vaporware!" were expecting. When you are as large as Microsoft you don't change the basic usage paradigms in the OS since that invalidates training of the corporate drones which makes the corporations dislike your OS (not to mention the milions of clueless users). With that restriction, I can't see how they could make something revolutionary in the frontend.

Posted: **2006-02-09 06:10am**

Sure, there are some major/minor changes, that we will have to pay through the teeth for, just like we had to going from Win 95 to Win 98, from Win 98 to Win ME, and from Win NT 4 to Win XP.

I think what bugs a lot of people is:

Why did it take so long for a mere incremental advance?
Where are the host of features that were initially promised?

FFS, they've been promising us an object/DBMS file-system ever since Chicago! Does anyone even remember the code-name for what eventually became Win95? It's been over ten years and we still don't have the revolutionary filesystem - It was one of the first things dropped from Loooooonghorn/Vista.

Posted: **2006-02-09 08:20am**

I disagree, its not vapourware, you, I, can just google and quickly find the latest Vista build, download and try it.

What I do agree is a lack of basic new 'cool' features, theres alot of solid new features that developers or office users will love, but I look at the feature list, and except for DX10, its all meh. Thats what hurting with Vista, a lack of anything WoWy.

Posted: **2006-02-09 08:46am**

It isn't just the lack of amazing new features (although of course they will have pillaged all the neat features from everything else) but that it's apparently been so very hard for MS to make it. I'm less interested in either the shiny new interface or the backend improvements: I think it's funny how much corporate garbage apparently goes on at MS. Feature creep, then cancelled features, then promising functionality promised in the 90s, then drawing back again.

Unless it's as easy to use as OSX and as secure as unixes, I'm just not going to be impressed.

Posted: **2006-02-09 09:15am**

Stark wrote:Unless it's as easy to use as OSX and as secure as unixes, I'm just not going to be impressed.

You realize that Windows 2003 sp1(which the Vista codebase is based off) is easily the most secure codebase to ever come out of Microsoft? Even Win2k3 has a bloody got rep security wise.

Posted: **2006-02-09 09:19am**

Cool! So they're charging us for fixing bugs to the product they've already sold us!

Posted: **2006-02-09 10:59am**

Ace Pace wrote:I disagree, its not vapourware, you, I, can just google and quickly find the latest Vista build, download and try it.

What I do agree is a lack of basic new 'cool' features, theres alot of solid new features that developers or office users will love, but I look at the feature list, and except for DX10, its all meh. Thats what hurting with Vista, a lack of anything WoWy.

From what I gathered by the article, the vapourware is the large chunk of cool stuff MS promised in Vista (and likely also for XP in 2001) that has, once again, slid off to another project. So a lot of what people wanted and expected in Vista has been kept back to be implemented in "Vienna". I don't know the specifics, but I do hear a lot of voices saying Vista is a shallow husk of what was formerly promised.

Plus, the nine different versions of the OS coming out is going to confuse a lot of people if they do want to upgrade. Personally, I can't see any reason not to just go for the Ultimate Edition, depending on pricing.

Posted: **2006-02-09 11:02am**

Admiral Valdemar wrote:
Ace Pace wrote:I disagree, its not vapourware, you, I, can just google and quickly find the latest Vista build, download and try it.

What I do agree is a lack of basic new 'cool' features, theres alot of solid new features that developers or office users will love, but I look at the feature list, and except for DX10, its all meh. Thats what hurting with Vista, a lack of anything WoWy.
From what I gathered by the article, the vapourware is the large chunk of cool stuff MS promised in Vista (and likely also for XP in 2001) that has, once again, slid off to another project. So a lot of what people wanted and expected in Vista has been kept back to be implemented in "Vienna". I don't know the specifics, but I do hear a lot of voices saying Vista is a shallow husk of what was formerly promised.

Plus, the nine different versions of the OS coming out is going to confuse a lot of people if they do want to upgrade. Personally, I can't see any reason not to just go for the Ultimate Edition, depending on pricing.

Everything you say its true, yet you can't call Vista vapourware, I'm not disagreeing its currently useless, but vapourware is something else. Duke Nukem Forever, for example is vapourware.

Just wrong word.

Posted: **2006-02-09 11:03am**

WyrdNyrd wrote:Why did it take so long for a mere incremental advance?

Because they're rewriting core components of the operating systems and had to start over (more or less) halfway through the development process?

FFS, they've been promising us an object/DBMS file-system ever since Chicago! Does anyone even remember the code-name for what eventually became Win95? It's been over ten years and we still don't have the revolutionary filesystem - It was one of the first things dropped from Loooooonghorn/Vista.

WinFS is in beta and available for download from MSDN. Why did it take so long? Probably because it hasn't been a top priority at Microsoft and such a thing is probably quite difficult to get right.

WyrdNyrd wrote:Cool! So they're charging us for fixing bugs to the product they've already sold us!

WTF are you on? XP support will continue for some time.

Admiral Valdemar wrote:Plus, the nine different versions of the OS coming out is going to confuse a lot of people if they do want to upgrade. Personally, I can't see any reason not to just go for the Ultimate Edition, depending on pricing.

Well, do you need the fancy features of VUE? Also, the many differing versions is pretty dumb - Microsoft could have compacted it down by offering the MCE component standalone.

Posted: **2006-02-09 11:08am**

Question since I can't find any clear information, what are the differant versions of Vista and what will they be offering?

Posted: **2006-02-09 11:11am**

Personally, a nicer looking GUI would be wasted on me, unless it was nicer looking and didn't eat processor time and RAM. OS-X is very smooth under load even, if MS can promise Aero to be as good with minimum requirements needed, it'd be nice. What I see as being the main selling point, which the article mentions, is the new API and security features etc. that get rid of Win32 and improve other parts while adding standalone programs like the spyware app. for XP into the mix. Emphasis is certainly on security more than revolutionary stuff.

As for the other types of the package, two are necessary because of EU laws mandating there be editions that don't have WMP11, so the minimum you could have would be a Home Edition, a Professional Edition for business acting as a new NT server and the two versions sans-WMP. Bureacracy is behind this as much as MS giving silly options.

Posted: **2006-02-09 11:24am**

From what I've read, Vista is going to be to XP what XP is to 98. It's a complete overhaul and appears to be a genuine effort by Microsoft at reworking their attitude toward security. They're implementing least-required privileges, similar to what Mac OS X has. If 2003 is any indication, Vista will ship pretty well locked-down by default. And there are plenty of changes beyond security. The Monad shell alone is pretty damned cool-looking.

But the dumbest thing about Vista has got to be the 7,000 different versions Microsoft is going to offer. Making software work across all the versions is going to be an utter pain in the ass for developers.

Posted: **2006-02-09 11:24am**

Admiral Valdemar wrote:Personally, a nicer looking GUI would be wasted on me, unless it was nicer looking and didn't eat processor time and RAM. OS-X is very smooth under load even, if MS can promise Aero to be as good with minimum requirements needed, it'd be nice. What I see as being the main selling point, which the article mentions, is the new API and security features etc. that get rid of Win32 and improve other parts while adding standalone programs like the spyware app. for XP into the mix. Emphasis is certainly on security more than revolutionary stuff.

Aero should be smooth under load, perhaps even smoother than OS X's interface (as DirectX tends to be more mature than OS X's OpenGL implementations)

As for the other types of the package, two are necessary because of EU laws mandating there be editions that don't have WMP11, so the minimum you could have would be a Home Edition, a Professional Edition for business acting as a new NT server and the two versions sans-WMP. Bureacracy is behind this as much as MS giving silly options.

There will be a new server OS, but you do need a client "Professional Edition" with AD support for the corporations.

Durandal wrote:But the dumbest thing about Vista has got to be the 7,000 different versions Microsoft is going to offer. Making software work across all the versions is going to be an utter pain in the ass for developers.

There are many versions, true, but the core functionality remains the same so I don't think there should be a problem unless MCE or AD support is absolutely needed.

Posted: **2006-02-09 11:29am**

Durandal wrote:
But the dumbest thing about Vista has got to be the 7,000 different versions Microsoft is going to offer. Making software work across all the versions is going to be an utter pain in the ass for developers.

I would assume the basic kernel would allow for developers to program for the whole range, rather than specialise apps. for each flavour. I never saw anything on Home and Pro of XP that ran exclusively or worse off on one version compared to another.

Posted: **2006-02-09 11:32am**

Kernels can be the same all they want. But one version may have APIs that another doesn't. Even if it's the intention to have software work across all versions of Vista seamlessly, anyone who's ever developed any kind of moderately-complex software knows that's a pipe-dream. Hell, XP-64 broke one of our in-house applications for what I guess was a problem with the return string in an API call. By all rights, the XP-64 and XP APIs should have been exactly the same. But shit breaks. That's just a reality of development.

And you still have to test across all the possible versions you're going to deploy on. QA can't leave any stone unturned.

Posted: **2006-02-09 11:33am**

ggs wrote:
Stark wrote:Unless it's as easy to use as OSX and as secure as unixes, I'm just not going to be impressed.
You realize that Windows 2003 sp1(which the Vista codebase is based off) is easily the most secure codebase to ever come out of Microsoft? Even Win2k3 has a bloody got rep security wise.

Microsoft != security, which I think was Stark's point. Now, if M$ wanted to make a secure easyish OS, they could just steal from BSD for the OS, since the BSD license allows that, and make a nice X window manager to go on top of it. Sadly, Gates is too arrogant to admit that his products are garbage and his delusions of adequacy keep pushing M$ into markets where it is clearly outclassed (witness Windows Cluster Edition). I predict over $5 bn of business losses worldwide due to exploited and unpatched Vista security flaws within the first year of its eventual release, and you can quote me on that.

Posted: **2006-02-09 11:55am**

Xisiqomelir wrote:Microsoft != security, which I think was Stark's point. Now, if M$ wanted to make a secure easyish OS, they could just steal from BSD for the OS, since the BSD license allows that, and make a nice X window manager to go on top of it.

Oh, joy, lets abandon years of work on the NT kernel just for BSD - nevermind that now Microsoft has to figure out how to make existing applications run - and run well. But hey, *nix zealotry is okay as long as it's bashing Microsoft, right?

Sadly, Gates is too arrogant to admit that his products are garbage and his delusions of adequacy keep pushing M$ into markets where it is clearly outclassed (witness Windows Cluster Edition). I predict over $5 bn of business losses worldwide due to exploited and unpatched Vista security flaws within the first year of its eventual release, and you can quote me on that.

Ah, yes, WCE is "clearly outclassed?" Praytell how? It certainly is more expensive than deploying Linux to a few thousand nodes but on a technical level I see no reason why it should fail.

As for losses, easy to make claims, eh? Of course, it is rather unlikely that businesses will touch Vista for at least a year (perhaps more).

Posted: **2006-02-09 12:02pm**

Durandal wrote:Kernels can be the same all they want. But one version may have APIs that another doesn't. Even if it's the intention to have software work across all versions of Vista seamlessly, anyone who's ever developed any kind of moderately-complex software knows that's a pipe-dream. Hell, XP-64 broke one of our in-house applications for what I guess was a problem with the return string in an API call. By all rights, the XP-64 and XP APIs should have been exactly the same. But shit breaks. That's just a reality of development.

And you still have to test across all the possible versions you're going to deploy on. QA can't leave any stone unturned.

I guess then my initial fears of this overzealous number of editions being a burden more than anything were correct. I don't expect MS to have produced a load of different types of the same system that operate interchangeably perfectly.

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Vista Vapourware?

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